This is a personal project by @dellsystem. I built this to
help me retain
information from the books I'm reading. Currently can only be used by
a single user (myself), but I plan to extend it to support multiple
users eventually.

New Labour’s greatest intellectual error, on the economy, was to forget the good sense of the labour movement, and presume — showing its fealty to neoclassical economics — that the whirring machine of capitalism would produce the goods which a benevolent government could then seek to redistribute in more acceptable manner. [...]

[...] New Labour ended up taking from the somewhat better off, and giving to the worse off: inequality at the very top of society was left to skyrocket, unchallenged. But they failed, singularly, to address the economy’s structural flaws: its growing dependency on household debt, its yawning balance of payments, its ballooning financial institutions. A failure to tackle these — indeed, on the last, the active encouragement of said ballooning — helped drive the economy full-tilt into the brick wall of the global financial crisis of the late 2000s. As a result of this crisis, austerity measures are now busily tearing through those mildly redistributive measures Labour introduced: Education Maintenance Allowance — gone; Sure Start centres — chopped; tax credits — going. The fruits of New Labour’s compromise with high finance lasted no longer than a decade; it was able to defend, partially, some of the historic gains of the labour movement, most notably the NHS, but even those are now, under austerity, open to attack.

New Labour’s greatest intellectual error, on the economy, was to forget the good sense of the labour movement, and presume — showing its fealty to neoclassical economics — that the whirring machine of capitalism would produce the goods which a benevolent government could then seek to redistribute in more acceptable manner. [...]

[...] New Labour ended up taking from the somewhat better off, and giving to the worse off: inequality at the very top of society was left to skyrocket, unchallenged. But they failed, singularly, to address the economy’s structural flaws: its growing dependency on household debt, its yawning balance of payments, its ballooning financial institutions. A failure to tackle these — indeed, on the last, the active encouragement of said ballooning — helped drive the economy full-tilt into the brick wall of the global financial crisis of the late 2000s. As a result of this crisis, austerity measures are now busily tearing through those mildly redistributive measures Labour introduced: Education Maintenance Allowance — gone; Sure Start centres — chopped; tax credits — going. The fruits of New Labour’s compromise with high finance lasted no longer than a decade; it was able to defend, partially, some of the historic gains of the labour movement, most notably the NHS, but even those are now, under austerity, open to attack.

[...] there’s a very interesting discourse that I quote in my book in chapter 13 by the founder of Sciences Po, and so that was right after the expanse of the commune, which was very traumatic at least for the elite, a very traumatic experience of redistribution in France. And so he has a very clear way to explain, well okay, now that we have universal suffrage, there’s a risk that basically the poor and the majority of the population will try to expropriate us, the elite. We have to display merits and our own standings so that it will be a completely crazy idea to get rid of us. So in a way it’s as if the meritocracy, the modern meritocracy discourse is invented as a way to protect the elite from democracy basically, from the universal suffrage. And he has a way to put it, which is very interesting, because at the same time Sciences Po is a private institution with very high tuition fees where it’s difficult to access if you’re not from the elite. So in the end this is the same elite in the sense that if you don’t come from a high income group it’s very difficult to access this elite, so — , but in terms of discourse it tries to present itself as based on merit.

[...] there’s a very interesting discourse that I quote in my book in chapter 13 by the founder of Sciences Po, and so that was right after the expanse of the commune, which was very traumatic at least for the elite, a very traumatic experience of redistribution in France. And so he has a very clear way to explain, well okay, now that we have universal suffrage, there’s a risk that basically the poor and the majority of the population will try to expropriate us, the elite. We have to display merits and our own standings so that it will be a completely crazy idea to get rid of us. So in a way it’s as if the meritocracy, the modern meritocracy discourse is invented as a way to protect the elite from democracy basically, from the universal suffrage. And he has a way to put it, which is very interesting, because at the same time Sciences Po is a private institution with very high tuition fees where it’s difficult to access if you’re not from the elite. So in the end this is the same elite in the sense that if you don’t come from a high income group it’s very difficult to access this elite, so — , but in terms of discourse it tries to present itself as based on merit.

Without understanding the complex interplay of things, it’s hard not to feel resentful about certain things that we do see. But at the same time, it’s not possible to hold onto the complexity. I can appreciate why individuals are indignant when they feel as though they pay taxes for that money to be given away to foreigners through foreign aid and immigration programs. These people feel like they’re struggling; like they’re working hard; like they’re facing injustice. Still, it makes sense to me that people’s sense of prosperity is only as good as their feeling that they’re getting ahead. And when you’ve been earning $40/hour doing union work only to lose that job and feel like the only other option is a $25/hour job, the feeling is bad, no matter that this is more than most people make. There’s a reason that Silicon Valley engineers feel as though they’re struggling, and it’s not because they’re comparing themselves to everyone in the world. It’s because the standard of living keeps dropping in front of them. It’s all relative.

It’s easy to say “tough shit” or “boo hoo hoo,” or to point out that most people have it much worse. And, at some levels, this is true. But if we don’t account for how people feel, we’re not going to achieve a more just world — we’re going to stoke the fires of a new cultural war as society becomes increasingly polarized.

Without understanding the complex interplay of things, it’s hard not to feel resentful about certain things that we do see. But at the same time, it’s not possible to hold onto the complexity. I can appreciate why individuals are indignant when they feel as though they pay taxes for that money to be given away to foreigners through foreign aid and immigration programs. These people feel like they’re struggling; like they’re working hard; like they’re facing injustice. Still, it makes sense to me that people’s sense of prosperity is only as good as their feeling that they’re getting ahead. And when you’ve been earning $40/hour doing union work only to lose that job and feel like the only other option is a $25/hour job, the feeling is bad, no matter that this is more than most people make. There’s a reason that Silicon Valley engineers feel as though they’re struggling, and it’s not because they’re comparing themselves to everyone in the world. It’s because the standard of living keeps dropping in front of them. It’s all relative.

It’s easy to say “tough shit” or “boo hoo hoo,” or to point out that most people have it much worse. And, at some levels, this is true. But if we don’t account for how people feel, we’re not going to achieve a more just world — we’re going to stoke the fires of a new cultural war as society becomes increasingly polarized.

It took me years to understand that the boys who tormented me in college didn’t feel powerful, didn’t see their antagonism as oppression. I was even louder and more brash back then than I am now. I walked into any given room performing confidence in ways that completely obscured my insecurities. I took up space, used my sexuality as a tool, and demanded attention. These were the survival skills that I had learned to harness as a ticket out. And these are the very same skills that have allowed me to succeed professionally and get access to tremendous privilege. I have paid a price for some of the games that I have played, but I can’t deny that I’ve gained a lot in the process. I have also come to understand that my survival strategies were completely infuriating to many geeky white boys that I encountered in tech. Many guys saw me as getting ahead because I was a token woman. I was accused of sleeping my way to the top on plenty of occasions. I wasn’t simply seen as an alpha — I was seen as the kind of girl that screwed boys over. And because I was working on diversity and inclusion projects in computer science to attract more women and minorities to the field, I was seen as being the architect of excluding white men. For so many geeky guys I met, CS was the place where they felt powerful, and I stood for taking that away. I represented an oppressor to them even though I felt like it was they who were oppressing me.

It took me years to understand that the boys who tormented me in college didn’t feel powerful, didn’t see their antagonism as oppression. I was even louder and more brash back then than I am now. I walked into any given room performing confidence in ways that completely obscured my insecurities. I took up space, used my sexuality as a tool, and demanded attention. These were the survival skills that I had learned to harness as a ticket out. And these are the very same skills that have allowed me to succeed professionally and get access to tremendous privilege. I have paid a price for some of the games that I have played, but I can’t deny that I’ve gained a lot in the process. I have also come to understand that my survival strategies were completely infuriating to many geeky white boys that I encountered in tech. Many guys saw me as getting ahead because I was a token woman. I was accused of sleeping my way to the top on plenty of occasions. I wasn’t simply seen as an alpha — I was seen as the kind of girl that screwed boys over. And because I was working on diversity and inclusion projects in computer science to attract more women and minorities to the field, I was seen as being the architect of excluding white men. For so many geeky guys I met, CS was the place where they felt powerful, and I stood for taking that away. I represented an oppressor to them even though I felt like it was they who were oppressing me.

For most, Silicon Valley is at a distance, a far-off land of imagination brought to you by the likes of David Fincher and HBO. Progressive values demand empathy for the poor, and this often manifests as hatred for the rich. But what’s missing from this mindset is an understanding of the local perception of wealth, poverty, and status. And, more importantly, the political consequences of that local perception.

Think about it this way. I live in New York City, where the median household income is somewhere around $55K. My network primarily makes above the median, and yet they all complain that they don’t have enough money to achieve what they want in New York, whether they’re making $55K, $70K, or $150K. Complaining about not having enough money is ritualized alongside complaining about the rents. No one I know really groks that they’re making above the median income for the city (and, thus, that most people are much poorer than they are), let alone how absurd their complaints might sound to someone from a poorer country where a median income might be $1,500 (e.g., India).

The reason for this is not simply that people living in New York City are spoiled, but that people’s understanding of prosperity is shaped by what they see around them. [...]

[...]

In other words, in a neoliberal society, we consistently compare ourselves to others in ways that make us feel as though we are less well off than we’d like. And we mock others who are more privileged who do the same. (And, horribly, we often blame others who are not for making bad decisions.)

For most, Silicon Valley is at a distance, a far-off land of imagination brought to you by the likes of David Fincher and HBO. Progressive values demand empathy for the poor, and this often manifests as hatred for the rich. But what’s missing from this mindset is an understanding of the local perception of wealth, poverty, and status. And, more importantly, the political consequences of that local perception.

Think about it this way. I live in New York City, where the median household income is somewhere around $55K. My network primarily makes above the median, and yet they all complain that they don’t have enough money to achieve what they want in New York, whether they’re making $55K, $70K, or $150K. Complaining about not having enough money is ritualized alongside complaining about the rents. No one I know really groks that they’re making above the median income for the city (and, thus, that most people are much poorer than they are), let alone how absurd their complaints might sound to someone from a poorer country where a median income might be $1,500 (e.g., India).

The reason for this is not simply that people living in New York City are spoiled, but that people’s understanding of prosperity is shaped by what they see around them. [...]

[...]

In other words, in a neoliberal society, we consistently compare ourselves to others in ways that make us feel as though we are less well off than we’d like. And we mock others who are more privileged who do the same. (And, horribly, we often blame others who are not for making bad decisions.)

The engine of the global economy should be investment. Investment in what? In people. Not in paper — stocks, currencies, and so on. But real investment in human lives. Whether hospitals, schools, universities, public healthcare systems, transport, research, and so on. Money should be pouring into investments that elevate the stagnant boundaries of real human potential.

The engine of the global economy should be investment. Investment in what? In people. Not in paper — stocks, currencies, and so on. But real investment in human lives. Whether hospitals, schools, universities, public healthcare systems, transport, research, and so on. Money should be pouring into investments that elevate the stagnant boundaries of real human potential.

For one thing, insisting that certain types of clothing, activities, food, etc, can only be worn, mastered or enjoyed by certain peoples can only serve to divide and alienate. Condemnation of dreadlocks on non-blacks, yoga practised or taught by non-Indians, Chinese food chefs who aren’t Chinese, can never reduce or end racism, because the reason for racism isn’t appreciation, adoption and interest towards other cultures, but ignorance, ostracisation and othering of them. [...]

For one thing, insisting that certain types of clothing, activities, food, etc, can only be worn, mastered or enjoyed by certain peoples can only serve to divide and alienate. Condemnation of dreadlocks on non-blacks, yoga practised or taught by non-Indians, Chinese food chefs who aren’t Chinese, can never reduce or end racism, because the reason for racism isn’t appreciation, adoption and interest towards other cultures, but ignorance, ostracisation and othering of them. [...]

When you’re a child trapped in a situation of physical or psychological deprivation, you learn shame as an efficient, elegant mechanism of survival: Shame at once shields you from the reality that danger is out of your control (since the problem is not that you’re unloved and deprived, it’s that you’re Bad) and simultaneously prevents you from doing or saying anything challenging that might provoke a threat.

As adults, shame makes us curl away from the intensity and potential danger of authentic, compassionate relationships. It tells us to run away from ambiguity and to either submit or lash out at those whom we think might threaten us.

When you’re a child trapped in a situation of physical or psychological deprivation, you learn shame as an efficient, elegant mechanism of survival: Shame at once shields you from the reality that danger is out of your control (since the problem is not that you’re unloved and deprived, it’s that you’re Bad) and simultaneously prevents you from doing or saying anything challenging that might provoke a threat.

As adults, shame makes us curl away from the intensity and potential danger of authentic, compassionate relationships. It tells us to run away from ambiguity and to either submit or lash out at those whom we think might threaten us.

Rather than simply connect us to what our friends are doing, or helping college kids find a party to go to, social media platforms today have conceived of a much grander product to sell: existence. By means of their platforms we obtain existence in the new public sphere, we become observable. Facebook and Twitter don’t just allow us to share moments or memories, they allow us to become, they stream our data to the world so that we might suggest our social existence to others. This is the true dream of the Facebergian global community, a new social dimension into which we project and become, a phantom world of dream bodies peering through the brush of a jungle of data in order to observe one another as we engage in the intimate act of becoming.

We are all always engaged in some kind of self-narratization, not only do we use Zuckerberg’s platform to weave that tale of becoming, but our doing so is in turn predicated on our acceptance of the entrepreneurial bildungsroman of Faceberg and Dorsey, that they give us existence within the global community they benevolently foster. [...]

Rather than simply connect us to what our friends are doing, or helping college kids find a party to go to, social media platforms today have conceived of a much grander product to sell: existence. By means of their platforms we obtain existence in the new public sphere, we become observable. Facebook and Twitter don’t just allow us to share moments or memories, they allow us to become, they stream our data to the world so that we might suggest our social existence to others. This is the true dream of the Facebergian global community, a new social dimension into which we project and become, a phantom world of dream bodies peering through the brush of a jungle of data in order to observe one another as we engage in the intimate act of becoming.

We are all always engaged in some kind of self-narratization, not only do we use Zuckerberg’s platform to weave that tale of becoming, but our doing so is in turn predicated on our acceptance of the entrepreneurial bildungsroman of Faceberg and Dorsey, that they give us existence within the global community they benevolently foster. [...]

Many of the biggest social media platforms share this one thing in common, they were products designed to connect younger people to parties and facilitate sex. Maybe it is laudable that Jack and Zuckerberg have made an effort to reconceptualize the purpose of their products on such socially conscious terms, but I for one am suspicious of their self-narratives, I am suspicious that it isn’t really all about one thing for them: riding the hype-train into a golden sunset of unlimited wealth. The ambition, certainly, has always been there for the entrepreneur, but the justification of that ambition, the story, that comes after the fact; the story is something designed to conceal the emptiness of the ambition that drives the entrepreneur, the empty ambition of wealth, celebrity and success.

Many of the biggest social media platforms share this one thing in common, they were products designed to connect younger people to parties and facilitate sex. Maybe it is laudable that Jack and Zuckerberg have made an effort to reconceptualize the purpose of their products on such socially conscious terms, but I for one am suspicious of their self-narratives, I am suspicious that it isn’t really all about one thing for them: riding the hype-train into a golden sunset of unlimited wealth. The ambition, certainly, has always been there for the entrepreneur, but the justification of that ambition, the story, that comes after the fact; the story is something designed to conceal the emptiness of the ambition that drives the entrepreneur, the empty ambition of wealth, celebrity and success.